I liked this one eventually. It just took a while to get going, and I felt the early parts of the book were like slogging through heavy mud to get to the climax. That said, once it picked up I really enjoyed it. Enough to go get the other books in the series anyway. I’ve since started the second book and I’m finding the same slow start. It’s a tiny bit annoying.

The vampires in this book are actually scary. I mean really honestly scary monsters. In fact, most of the supernatural elements of the story are pretty scary, and that’s nice to see. I also really liked Harper Blaine, the heroine. She’s tough, without tasting of rawhide.

It’s a fun paranormal mystery.

Two things bothered me through out the book. First, even though the book was only published four years ago, the tech feels stuck in the nineties. I could be wrong, but the tech stuff just felt really out dated. Also, there was a passing mention of the outdatedness of the grudge movement, which ended around the late 90s. So yes it is outdated, it’s just outdated much longer then the passing mention makes you think. Honestly I think this manuscript was sitting around for a long time in the author’s head/computer before it got published. It’s not a make or break thing, just a minor annoyance.

The other thing that bothered me was the fact that our hero kept waffling between belief and unbelief depending on the amount of background the author needed to present. So there would be info dumps where Harper just kind of nods and goes along with it and then when the information was done being presented, she’s got her back up and refusing to believe it. And I never felt that those presenting the information were trying to persuade her, but rather that she agreed with them right up to the point where the author decided she needed conflict again. This is a much greater annoyance, however once again I don’t think it’s a deal breaker. Mostly because this was the introductory book so the likely hood of clunky exposition goes up.

Also, the book hit on a few of the tropes that really annoy me. First the ‘I’m different and so no one will ever understand me and thus I’m doomed to be alone’ trope. Argh, kill me now. And second the ‘money is tight, but I never really have to worry about it, or decide I can’t afford something right at that moment’ trope. Now granted that second one doesn’t come into play as much, as it’s kind of skimmed over.